Kage No Shita
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: Suguru's life has always been under the light of his famous uncle? When did he learn to break through?


Disclaimer: Gravi's not mine, yadda yadda yadda...  
  
Kage no shita (Under a Shadow)  
by Yui Miyamoto  
  
All my life, there was a war that I knew I could lose pieces of myself if I wasn't careful. If I had listened to everything everyone had to say, I'd go inside.  
And so, I became quiet and withdrawn from my family. Well, that and with a smile on my face.  
  
But under it, I held great resentment.  
  
It was as if I were part of the background...   
  
Ever since I was little, I had heard the same comments, but the more and more I heard them, I didn't care. But just so many people were crowding me. And who would look at me with a light under than his own?  
  
I didn't hate him for any of it. Never  
  
No, we got along just fine. It was the standard I was given in comparison...  
a man whose greatness surpassed many by the time he reached twenty-five-years of age.  
  
But even before then, he was kind of like an idol, yet something that haunted me for so many years...  
  
"Uncle Touma will babysit you while we're gone, okay, Sugu-kun?" my mother said as she kissed me on the forehead and left with my father to go on a mini trip and would be back in a day or two.  
I looked at him and his hand over mine as we waved bye bye to my parents.   
And I remember that when I bumped into a vase, he caught it before it fell on me.  
At three, I found him very cool as he dusted himself off carefully and demanded if I was all right with a calm voice.   
  
When I was five, I walked to school with a hat, my uniform, and a backpack that uncle had given to me.  
He had patted my head and said, "I'm giving this to you so take good care of it."  
Nodding happily and hugging him, I smiled.  
"He gave me something," I had thought. "I'll keep it really good. Uncle said so."  
  
As I went through school though, I dreaded it as the years went on.  
All my teachers would say: "Oh, so you're Touma Seguchi's cousin? He was such a good student. I'm sure you are too..." "Are you in a band too? You know? He was in a band in high school."   
Many similar comments ensued and I began to become irritated.  
  
I thought it would be different if I tried something different such as art, but that in itself was both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because I found something I loved. It just happened that my uncle had influenced me so much that I learned some of the things he did, especially in music.  
It was a curse because I was constantly told that my music was okay, but that if I was to get anywhere, I would have to try harder.  
  
The hardest thing I ever took was the blow my music teacher gave me:  
"If you are ever to perfect your sound, study your uncle's music and everyone else's. Then, make your own sound."  
And with that, I didn't go to lessons anymore. By the time I was thirteen, I had taken my toll of comments and was no longer going to swallow them quietly.  
  
So, I studied music myself.  
  
I didn't ask anyone anymore, especially my uncle.  
  
It's not that I hated him for this predicament, but he had somehow become my enemy. I was living under his shadow. And the only light anyone would ever see me as was through his own...  
This always repeated in my head.  
  
I cried and cried for hours at the park until I couldn't cry anymore. It was no use. I would have to learn...  
  
I would have to learn to stand up...  
  
I had smiled and liked being compared to my uncle for a while, but the pain became too much. The standards were too high.  
  
And being only 8 or 9 at the time, I wanted to be like him...until my music teacher said that awful comment. But in a way, I am thankful for it.  
If I didn't, I would always look up to my uncle and wish I were him. I knew his shortcomings and his weaknesses, but he always excentuated his strengths...  
  
...and that was one lesson I had learned from him.  
  
[flashback]  
"Suguru...kun?" My uncle happened to take a relaxing walk in the park that day. "Oi, Suguru."  
  
Damn fate...  
  
My uncle of 29 was dresssed in a red, sleeveless shirt and with black pants. He always wore things that seemed strange, yet charasmatic at the same time.  
And he could always pull it off.  
  
I hate how he does that...  
  
"Mm." I turned the other way. "Yes?"  
"Why are turning away?" He sat down and patted my head. "Are you mad at me?"  
  
I want to scream 'YESSSS!!!!!" But I'm confused...  
  
"In a way." I bluntly said in a flat tone. Continuing to hug my knees and look away in anger, I stared at the people passing by.  
"Doushite?" The smile he wore vanished. He then looked at me seriously. "Tell me what's on your mind, Sugu-kun."  
  
He hadn't called me that since I was a kid...  
and this got me even more mad...  
  
"I'm sick of it." I huffed. Then, I stood up and turned around. With an intensity I had never known was in me, I shouted something I never thought I would. Especially at him.  
  
"I HATE YOU!"  
  
"Huh?" He then became more confused and looked at me with a shocked face, but still calm as I trembled in anger and frustration. "Where'd this come from?"  
"All my life, I've always been compared to you, but you know what? I'm not you. I am me." I clenched my fists and whispered, "I am Suguru Fujisaki..."  
Then, my uncle's eyes narrowed into slits. "Louder, Sugu-kun."  
  
Aah! He's calling me that again!!! Dammit!  
  
"I am Suguru Fujisaki and I am..." I said again a bit higher.  
  
As the people passed by, I didn't care if they stared. I had had it and I wasn't going to let a bunch of curious people break my concentration.  
  
"I can't hear you, Sugu-kun." he again said, but in an even harsher tone.   
"I am Suguru Fujisaki and I am not Touma Seguchi's shadow." I said a little louder than the previous two times.  
"You're too soft, Sugu-kun," my uncle monotonously said in a low tone.   
"Louder!!!! Are you saying this to me, or to yourself?!"  
  
Tick.  
  
Then, that voice that wanted to shout all those pains from all this passed time came rushing back to me. I shouted loudly with all that I could, "I AM SUGURU FUJISAKI! AND I AM NOT TOUMA SEGUCHI'S SHADOW!!!!"  
  
Panting, I stopped crying. I could no longer cry.  
  
It had finally come out.  
  
My uncle then nodded and smiled. Then, he shook his head as he pushed me to go home. "No, you aren't, Suguru-kun."  
  
For the first time, he had called me 'Suguru-kun'...  
  
When he looked at me and smiled, I realized it wasn't him at all. I had wanted to be under his shadow. I was scared to become that wasn't acceptable to myself nor the uncle that I had respected deeply and cared for as he had done with me.  
  
From then on, my reserve was so hard that I could never be moved by this criticism or comments that had once pierced me as if they were arrows directed to my heart.   
Though the people who compared me would never change, or these comments wouldn't ever stop, I had learned to accept them. In fact, I ignored them readily.  
  
Three years later, he asked me to go into Bad Luck. And I heartily agreed.  
As I look around this room as we're gathering for our third album's release party, I smiled widely.  
  
"Good arrangements," everyone had commented, but they especially patted me on my first song. And it happened to be playing in the background And this was tremendously encouraging on my part, though I always hid my insecurities by adapting the 'Seguchi' blood line's 'I-shall-not-faulter-in-what-I-say-and-or-do" attitude. Which sometimes, I am grateful to have...  
  
And my uncle just tipped his head.  
Without words, he had given me the biggest compliment I would ever keep inside of me.   
He never put in the background, but always pulled me to step forward...  
  
He knew what I was saying. He always did.   
I think that was one of things that made him so awesome to me...  
  
At my apartment, I played my song called 'After a while'. I grinned and sang along...  
  
"When the melody of yesterday played,  
I couldn't help but  
Repeat the theme that persisted  
in the crevices of my  
broken heart and I began  
to cry like a child  
unable to say what  
I really wanted to say.  
I am not your image...  
I think you've been mistaken.  
  
Break from that smile that fakes  
the trueness of today.  
Sayonara to yesterday's prejudices,  
I can live without them  
I can live without them now.  
  
When I heard the perpetual ringing  
I did nothing but cringe  
Continuing a line that haunted  
every part of me  
and the mask that began  
to break before me  
When I saw beyond what was there  
I killed that person  
who used to me...  
I was truly mistaken.  
  
Take me a rakuen that masquerades  
the hopes of tomorrow.  
Oh no, I won't accept that.  
I can't live like that.  
I can't live like that now.  
  
(whispers) And from me to you  
whisper louder to speak more than  
I should.  
I will not be quiet,  
not anymore.  
  
Break from that smile that fakes (tear it away quickly)  
the trueness of today. (that seemed so thin hours ago)  
Sayonara to yesterday's prejudices, (a dream forgotten in the seams)  
I can live without them (I certainly can)  
I can live without them now. (You just watch me.)"  
  
Repeating the last line, I convinced myself that this was true...  
  
  
---  
Author's note: I just thought of this about two hours ago and just decided to write it.  
Suguru has become very interesting indeed.  
Hope it was okay. I know, I'm into angsty fics... 


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